how best to launch a counter-offensive. Not surprisingly, therefore, Daniel Bourdanne,

General Secretary of IFES worldwide, makes the observation that ‘the university is…a

strategic place where the ideologies, philosophies and scientific theories of our modern

societies are formed. Yet the impact of evangelicalism is declining considerably in its

midst. Are we losing the battle for the mind...I strongly suspect that there might be a

significant correlation between our inadequate approach and the limited impact we are

having on society.’

If anything this oversight is more serious by a half than the earlier oversight which

Lausanne had to deal with in 1974. The challenge of social and political injustice did

require a more holistic view of mission and the Covenant was right to correct the earlier

mistakes. And for all that we can be thankful. But surely the challenge of a naturalistic

view of reality was even then a far greater challenge? Why then was it not addressed?

The same unbiblical view of spirituality which prevented a holistic view of mission also

crippled the church from getting involved intellectually. My point is this, Lausanne 1974

chose to deal with the first, but it said little or nothing about the second.

Which leaves us with a final question: will Cape Town Lausanne recognise its earlier

oversight and do something about it? Or will the central issue in post Enlightenment

Christianity yet again be overlooked? If it is then the western churches will continue their

decline – and, worse still, the churches in the rest of the world which currently thrive will

themselves be undermined.

One thing would make a radical difference. Antonio Gremsci calls it the deliberate

nurturing of ‘organic intellectuals’. As an Italian communist (who died in 1937) he

realised that armed revolution would be ineffective in turning Western Europe towards

Marxist ideology. His alternative, interestingly, was to reach back to the Protestant

Reformation model. What the Christian church did then, he argued, was to develop men

and women of sufficient intellectual ability and training who, because properly equipped

and adequately supported, were able to infiltrate and in due course take over the

institutions of cultural influence. What he had in mind no doubt were men like Roger

Ascham and William Cecil. Both were undergraduates at St. John’s College Cambridge,

and both had become Protestants by the mid 1530s. Ascham tutored the future queen and

her younger half brother, Edward VI. And Cecil, later Lord Burleigh, as Queen

Elizabeth’s principal Secretary, influenced almost every aspect of Elizabethan society.

They were ‘organic intellectuals’ (as over against ‘traditional intellectuals’) because they

espoused a different world-view to that of the establishment and, at the same time, were

able to argue their case with sufficient attractiveness and plausibility so that the whole

society followed their lead. At the heart of their success, however, lay a polemical

commitment. They realised that the conflict between the alternative worldviews vying for

power could be resolved only by outright opposition (polemos = war). Not a war of

physical arms, of course, but a war of ideas.

Recent steps to produce organic intellectuals within Evangelicalism have already made a

huge difference and are brim-full with promise. Leading atheists like Dawkins and

Hitchens have been challenged in public. Some university departments of philosophy

have even changed hands. Some schools and colleges have committed themselves to such

a project. Powerful apologetic tools have been produced by the bucket load. A noticeable

momentum has even been established through initiatives like the European Leadership

Forum in Hungary. My conclusion then is this: Cape Town Lausanne should openly and

unreservedly endorse and promote such models throughout the world. The change of

direction is already long overdue. It will not be without its discomforts and vociferous

complaints - and after our track record one can be excused for wondering if even so bold

an initiative as a Cape Town covenant can shift evangelicalism from its present ruts. But

it would be a good first step and, more importantly, it would be the right step. And under

God, who knows! Given western materialism’s emptiness and distress - which only the

blind could fail to see - it is just possible that such a step would ignite a new and

unquenchable Reformation which really would evangelise the entire human race.

3081 words

Ranald Macaulay, 15/10/2010

Feedback:

Richard Gunton (Guest)

19/10/2010 13:56

Thanks, Ranald - a recovery of the evangelical mind is surely the greatest challenge for those of us in the West (and perhaps everywhere). My great hope is that Christian students will increasingly have the vision and mentoring they need to develop their own subjects for Christ's glory. Knowing that Christ is Lord of all should give us confidence to explore new ideas and unimagined depths of intellectual innovation - while being deeply faithful to our Saviour.

Andrew Jackson (Guest)

19/10/2010 18:20

Thanks indeed Ranald: a really helpful summary of what's going on around us without most of us realising! We ignore philosophical naturalism at our peril. What today may be fought out among the intelligentsia will tomorrow become common playground speak!

John Hartung (Guest)

19/10/2010 22:39

I agree with you, Ranald. Unless we take seriously proposals like organic scholarship and organic intellectuals within the church, we delay confronting the plausibility structure of the present hour. Especially now, when our much of the success we have seen in our new evangelical elites has been in producing people who reject classical Christian orthodoxy for tri-theism, finite person theism, or process theism and who have rejected the Lutheran exegesis of Paul on Justification. Meanwhile, the movements in world mission are preponderently Pentecostal, that is, they are much the pietistic strain.

This means a return to the oversight of the church of gifted persons for these callings. And that means a renewal of the classical ideal of seminary education. Various concerns have led to a pragmatic turn in the design of seminary education. But we need to returnto BB Warfield's concept of a curriculum centered on the ministry of the Word, and in the robust rather than the minimalist sense. An M.Div. should be a true masters. Or we should go back to the five year Bachalor's of Divinity, where the seminary program is woven in with the regulariberal arts and sciences program. If we can't do this we need to do something much like it.

Martin Krause (Guest)

23/10/2010 20:52

Thanks for this excellent article, Ranald!Mt 9:37 Then he said to his disciples, The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.Mt 9:38 Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.